Garrettꦛ Gerloff looked to be on course for a third consecutive WorldSBK top five finish at Estoril, before the American lost control of his Yamaha R1 and took out Ducati rider Michael Rinaldi. 

Gerloff had finished both race one and the Superpole race෴ in fourꦯth place, a position he was running in once again. 

The GRT rider was just behind Toprak Razgatlioglu who was making an overtake on Rinaldi, b♏ut Gerloff made a mistake on entry to turn six and had nowhere to go but hit the Italian which caused both riders to DNF. 

A disappointing endꦯ to a Sunday that had started really well for the 25 year-old. 

🎃"Our Sunday started really well. We made some further improvements to the bike overnight and everything felt really good ﷽in the warm-up," said Gerloff.  

"I was excited f𝄹or the Superpole Race, which went smoothly: I had a better start and a better first corner than yesterday and I was able to keep up with the top 3. I felt really confident, but there 🐷were a couple of corners in which I was losing a little bit of ground. 

"Still, I was hap🉐py to get another fourth place and to gain a lot of useful infor🍌mation for the long race." 

Just a week bꦬefore the Portugal round, Gerloff was running second in Aragon and challenged Jonathan🐼 Rea for the lead during the same race two. 

It was a move that saw the second year WorldSBK rider fall after making contact mid-corner, while Rea was able to remai🐟n aboard his Kawasaki. Th♕at incident was just a case of out-braking himself. 

This on the other hand was a bizarre moment as Gerloff said the bike ‘kicked him’ when regaining traction and caused him to l🐬ose control due to the ‘violent’ nature of it. 

Gerloff added: "In Race 2 I had a great start and I was trying to settle 🧸in and keep calm, but I had a really strange moment going into turn 6: I braked a little earlier than I had all day in order to start saving some tyres, but the bike kicked me once the rear wheel sat do🔜wn. 

"It was so violent that I loℱst control. I did my best to slow down and go straight, but unfortunately I tagged another rider and we crashed. 

"I am glad that we were both okay, we will now try to put the acciden🎶t behind us and focus on the next round at Misano, which is a track that I really like."